


Interrogation

by boywonder



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Death, Gen, M/M, No Spoilers, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-26 22:43:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16690315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boywonder/pseuds/boywonder
Summary: Grindelwald’s hand tightened just a little on the stem of his glass before he forced himself to calm again. “I absolutely cannot have you question me in front of others. If you want to question me, do it here, when we’re alone. In front of others, you do what I tell you.”





	Interrogation

**Author's Note:**

> I saw the second film but I'm not about to spoil anyone on it soooo you can either fit this into the canon or not, idc
> 
> don't @ me about ships/don't read into it if you don't want
> 
> pls do me a favour and imagine literally anyone else alive besides Johnny Depp as Grindelwald too thx

“Do you know what an obscurial is?”

 

The man in the chair regarded the blond wizard warily. 

 

Grindelwald waved a hand. “Credence,” he said, softly. The tall, quiet boy stepped from behind Vinda to stand near Grindelwald. He didn’t look directly at the man in the chair. 

 

The man looked from Credence to Grindelwald, confused, and then annoyed. “Obscurials are children,” he said, practically spitting the words. “Everyone knows that.”

 

Grindelwald nodded, giving all appearance of earnestness, but Credence caught the darkness in his eyes. 

 

“Yes, I made that mistake once,” Grindelwald said. “It almost cost me everything.”

 

The man in the chair looked a little worried, but not exactly afraid. “If you’re looking to scare me—“

 

“Oh, no. Well. Maybe a little,” Grindelwald said, and a smile passed between him and Vinda like a private joke. He sat on the arm of the chair, hand resting on the back of it as he might sit near a close friend. “But on the contrary, I’m giving you a chance to escape alive. I’m afraid my boy doesn’t have the control not to rip you apart. It’s in both our interests for me to not resort to the obscurus.” His tone was perfectly conversational, as if he hadn’t already tried torture — as if he wasn’t threatening to murder the man. 

 

“I don’t believe you,” said the man, forcing confidence into a voice already hoarse from screaming. “Whoever heard of an obscurial living to be a grown man?”

 

Grindelwald nodded and patted the man’s arm, ignoring the flinch. “I was afraid you’d say that. Ah, well. I did warn you. Though you won’t have much time to regret your disbelief, I’m afraid.” He stood up again. “Credence,” he said, all friendliness gone from his tone and his face. 

 

Credence took a stilted step towards the man, finally looking at him, though the white clouds in his eyes didn’t seem to actually  _ see  _ the man. 

 

The man shrunk back as well as he could, though he was mostly pinned in place with magic and exhaustion. Though most people had never seen an obscurus burst out of a person anyway, the moments before Credence let the obscurus loose were disconcerting at the very least. 

 

Credence looked away from the man and back at Grindelwald for a moment, though his eyes did not clear. 

 

“What if I could control it enough that he doesn’t die?” Credence asked, the crackling of the obscurus waiting to be unleashed evident in his voice. 

 

Grindelwald turned towards him sharply. “What?” he asked, his tone as sharp as his movement. 

 

Credence looked down but not away. “I could just hurt him. Then they’ll know. They’ll know about me, they’ll believe you—“

 

“They’ll believe me when they see a corpse, too,” Grindelwald interrupted, unimpressed with the boy’s suggestion. 

 

Credence’s hands clenched into fists subconsciously. “You said you’d rather he was alive—“

 

“He made his choice,” Grindelwald said, cutting off the boy’s words again. He crossed the short distance between them and put a hand on Credence’s face, up near his jaw, pulling the boy’s face closer to him. Credence didn’t resist, but didn’t bring his eyes up, either. 

 

“Do as you’re told,” Grindelwald whispered into the boy’s ear. 

 

When Credence looked back at the now-terrified man gibbering in the chair, his face was no longer human. 

 

The boy shrank back into himself when it was over, the shrieking storm of the obscurus contained in his skin once more. The twisted corpse of the unlucky wizard Grindelwald had been interrogating lay lifeless and bloody in the chair. 

 

Vinda stared at it as if enraptured. Grindelwald looked merely satisfied. 

 

“Do something with that,” he told Vinda, waving his hand in the direction of the corpse. She nodded, immediately, and disapparated with the body. 

 

Grindelwald looked at Credence, who was once again looking more or less at the floor. 

 

“Credence,” he said, still sharp, “are you all right?”

 

Credence glanced up at him and nodded. Grindelwald held out a hand. “Good. Come.”

 

Credence didn’t hesitate to reach out and take the older wizard’s hand. Grindelwald disapparated them as soon as he did. 

 

Back at Grindelwald’s private quarters in the castle, he let go of Credence’s hand without ceremony. He gestured at a chair, not terribly unlike the armchair that the dead man had been sitting in. 

 

“Sit,” he instructed. He didn’t look at the boy. 

 

Credence sat. 

 

“Don’t get up,” the blond wizard continued. 

 

Credence didn’t answer. 

 

Grindelwald stalked out of the room, leaving Credence alone. The boy looked down at his hands, resting in his lap. He clenched and unclenched them. He could feel an old ball of fear rise. He shoved it down, telling himself that Grindelwald wasn’t like his ma — wasn’t like the woman who raised him. Fear was a hard monster to tame, though. 

 

After a few minutes, Grindelwald came back, holding two very differently shaped glasses, one in either hand. He came over and offered the smaller one to Credence. The wine glass he kept. 

 

Credence reached out and took the glass with both hands. He looked up at Grindelwald, questioning. 

 

“It’s just water,” Grindelwald said. “Drink it.”

 

Credence frowned down at the glass, but took a sip of it anyway. 

 

Grindelwald likewise took a sip of his wine, then turned away towards the fireplace. He lit a fire, wordlessly, waving a hand. 

 

“Credence,” he said, “what do I ask of you?”

 

Credence didn’t look up again. “Loyalty,” he mumbled. 

 

Grindelwald let his quietness go. “Yes. And?”

 

Credence hesitated, but after a moment, he responded, “Obedience?”

 

Grindelwald’s hand tightened just a little on the stem of his glass before he forced himself to calm again. “I absolutely cannot have you question me in front of others. If you want to question me, do it here, when we’re alone. In front of others, you do what I tell you.”

 

Credence shrank into himself a little. “Yes, sir,” he said. 

 

Grindelwald turned back around to face the boy. “I can’t believe I have to explain this to you,” he said, voice raised a bit, obviously annoyed.

 

Credence looked up again, though his eyes wouldn’t meet Grindelwald’s. “I just wanted to help!”

 

“I told you what you could do to help,” Grindelwald answered, stonily.

 

Credence stood up, “I know, but I just wanted—”

 

Grindelwald took a step forward. “What  did I tell you to do when we got home?” His voice was quieter now, almost too quiet.

 

Credence froze and stared back down at his mostly full glass of water. “Sit,” he answered.

 

“And?”

 

Credence forced himself to move again, folding back down into the chair. It was difficult, even after all these months, not to want to run and hide. “Don’t get up,” he answered.

 

Grindelwald stared down his nose at the boy, who still refused to look at him.

 

“If you want to try  _ just _ hurting people, we can,” Grindelwald said, changing the subject.

 

Credence shook his head, too quickly. “I want to do what you want me to do,” he said. Some small part of him did have  _ some _ moral objection to murdering people, but Grindelwald had never asked him to do it indiscriminately. It had always been for a purpose, even if that purpose was only proving a point. Anyway, he was already a murderer, and any of the wizards that stood against Grindelwald would kill him if they got the chance, just for being what he was. 

 

Grindelwald took another sip of wine and was quiet for a moment, though Credence could feel his gaze. “Drink your water,” he said.

 

Credence was still looking at the glass, of course. He wasn’t thirsty, though his mouth was dry as a bone. He realised the point, though; this wasn’t about whether he was thirsty, if it ever had been.

 

He raised the glass to his lips and drank the whole thing, still feeling Grindelwald’s eyes on him. Grindelwald sighed and moved to stand behind the chair. Credence didn’t move, as instructed.

 

The older wizard leaned down, hovering above Credence, quite close to him. He had softened, unexpectedly, though Credence could hardly tell his moods when he  _ could _ see the man, let alone when he couldn’t.

 

“My perfect boy,” he whispered, his breath moving Credence’s dark hair slightly. “My miracle. I don’t want to be cross with you.”

 

Credence sat up a little straighter at that. He wasn’t good at reading tone when people spoke, but he knew what those words meant — and he sought them out, always. He didn’t know how to take words like “perfect” and “miracle,” because surely neither was true, but he liked hearing them anyway. No one else had ever said such things to him.

 

“I don’t want you to be,” he said. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean—”

 

“Shh, I know,” Grindelwald said. He straightened up and downed the rest of his wine, then just let the glass fall to the floor. It hit the stone and shattered. The sound made Credence jump. Of course it didn’t matter; Grindelwald would just fix it when he felt like it.

 

The blond wizard walked back around the chair again, and crouched in front of Credence so that the boy would look at him.

 

“All of this is for you,” he said, catching Credence’s gaze, “for  _ freedom _ . You understand why I can’t have you question me in front of anyone else, don’t you?”

 

Credence nodded. “Yes, sir,” he whispered.

 

Grindelwald reached up and brushed his hand along the boy’s cheek. Credence, as always, leaned into his touch, eyes fluttering closed for a moment. Grindelwald let his hand linger there for a moment before standing up and taking it away.

 

He reached out and took Credence’s glass away. “You can go,” he said, and though it was a dismissal, there was fondness lingering in his tone.

 

Credence stood up, slowly, and walked toward the door. When he chanced a look back over his shoulder, Grindelwald was looking at the fire again, and not at him. He paused for a moment, thinking of speaking, but thought better of it and left. 

 

The broken glass was still there in the morning.

  
  



End file.
